The Search for
Ball Zero
Written by: Tony Dormanesh
Edited by: Jason Obrien
Copyright © 2015 TD All rights reserved.
ISBN-13:978-1505810820
ISBN-10:1505810825
CONTENTS
A Little Backstory
Ball Zero
Black Friday to Black Everyday
Oligopolies and ICs
Ads
Fuck Those Pussies in the Government
Warstores
Out of the Wild
Robbing the Old Shitty Walmart
One Last Night
The Elohssa Forest
Going Deeper
Toilet Paper, Bungle Shirts and Shrooming
Midnight Adventure
Ground Superiority
Cannibal Rocky Mountain Oysters
Perry X2
The Never Ending Forest?
Meeting the Band
Pinball DNA
Camp Rawk 5
King Alpha
Pussy Ass Humans
Primate LAN Party
G6
Perfectly Cloned Taint
Arcade Monkeys
Preparty
The Show
The Battle at Mosh Tree
The Real Thing
w00t
Kick Ass
Contact!
Two > One
The Tower
Dey Not Us
Why the Fuck Didn’t They Tell Us?!
Premature
Our Ball Zero
1
A LITTLE BACKSTORY
A guy sits on a couch playing video games. His name is Tony. He lives on Earth, population nearing 50 trillion. His reality might be your future--who can say in this multiverse? He lives in the twilight of the Golden Age of Humans on Earth, at the dawning of a new era, part of the generation of Humans that get to see Humanity fall from grace.
Wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe it was the right place at the right time? It’s hard to say being anywhere at of the fall of civilization is the “right place”. Unless you’re not a fan of human civilization on Earth. Most smart people wouldn’t be a fan of this consumer-driven, insatiable, Keeping up With The Kardashians-like society we’ve built. If you’re one of those people, kick back with a beer, and prepare for a wild hilarious ride.
Valley Forest was always a decent place; your average, middle class city. There were nice patches, there we’re not so nice places. They had all the chain stores, franchises and restaurants as well as a few hobos, like any suburb. So, at the time, it was pretty much a small reflection of most of the country. In other words, boring. Boring as shit. So utterly, brain-splattering boring that people would do anything to escape. A two hour movie, a week in the bottle, an hour at the mall, an eight hour acid trip, maybe even twenty years chasing the dragon. But no matter how people escape, they eventually come back home to the same boring place, so they’re always ready for the next escape. Sure, your iPhone gets better and the blockbuster movies have bigger, more realistic 3D explosions. But what happens to this nice, boring little city Tony grew up in, well, it was really bad and really good at the same time.
Tony’s hometown was a boring American city, blah, blah. There actually was one thing he truly loved about that place: In a sea of Best Buys, McDonalds and Walmarts, a crazy rich dude had erected a tribute to fun in the form of a sky-scratching tower. The cartoon lettering above the door said “The best and coolest place for games in the world.”, and it really was. It was Treetop Games, an arcade, game store and a pizza place all in one, and to Tony it defined the community as nothing else could.
As you come through the valley to get to Valley Forest, Treetop Games is the only unique landmark you’ll see. 10 stories tall, resembling the Space Needle rising above the leafy green circumference that surrounded the city. The tallest “normal” building in the city was only 5 or 6 stories tall, so Treetop really stood out. The tops of the biggest trees growing next to Treetop Games were less than half as tall as the structure. At first you just see the white supports pointing towards the sky, then the one or two floors nestled between the twisting metal, and the word “Treetop Games” in skinny, blue -block letters, each about to tip over.
Tony went to Treetop a lot. It had been around as long as he could remember. It was filled with nostalgia for him. He got his first Nintendo there, Genesis, all the way down the line of gaming consoles. Not to mention the first place he played Space Invaders, Pac Man, Robotron, Dragon’s Lair, Attack From Mars, Theater of Magic, etc. This could be a long list.
When Tony was a kid, a fond memory of his was being at Treetop Games, it was a smoky place where a lot of smelly old guys with long hair stood around big machines and every once in a while laughed really loud. He remembered his parents taking him as a child. To this day he can’t think of a reason why his parents would go there, but they did and he liked it. He didn’t ask about it, he didn’t care. He was along for the ride back then.
Until that one day, he remembers it clearly. Tony’s dad and his extra-smelly friend bought this black box type that hooked up to the tv. It had black, raised ridges across most of the front and the far end was slanted up with these cool looking, silver levers that you could pull up and down. It had this futuristic looking black controller with a big red button his dad was playing with. Tony remembered looking into the dusty glass case where they kept boxes of these things. He remembered it was hot and the sun was shining down on his face through the window. He remembered running his hand along the plastic ridges and feeling very familiar instantly. Tony’s dad bought an Atari that day, and later that day Tony discovered the magic of video games. From that day on, Tony went to Treetop Games for himself.
Treetop is on the outskirts of Valley Forest if you take the creatively named Main Street north, where the buildings and neighborhoods end at 41st Street. At 42nd Street there’s a slight downward sloping hill that goes about a quarter mile and Main Street ends at a T intersection. The hill isn’t too steep, but after a quarter mile, anyone on a bike is hauling ass and anyone on a skateboard is fighting the Speed Wobbles. (Tony did both of those many times.) At the end of Main Street, make a right at Park Street and Treetop Games is at the end of the street on your left.
Park Street was an old part of town that was basically abandoned when Tony was young. A few hundred yard stretch of old, straight road that was the northernmost street in Valley Forest, beyond which was hills and forest. When Treetop opened there were a lot of businesses down there--auto repair shops, some medical offices, and an old dog pound. Tony was too young to remember why, but all the businesses down there closed around the same time and Treetop was the only place that stayed open.
It always was very weird, this flashy arcade, surrounded by dark, chained, and boarded up empty buildings and menacing barbed wire. Somehow Park Street was forgotten by Valley Forest street repairs. It was full of potholes and huge cracks with grass growing. You couldn’t walk down the street without twisting an ankle. Main Street was a well-maintained street, so where the two streets crossed, the bright, black, new asphalt of Main Street contrasted with the old, grey Park Street. At points you could see the newer Main streets layers, stacking and overlapping the older Main streets, every couple of years, they’d add another layer of asphalt on top, leaving Park Street greyer and farther behind. Tony always thought it was like looking at the rings of tree, you could see the years pass with each layer of new asphalt. There were five or six layers the last time he bothered to count.
But the eccentric, rich owner of Treetop never let the government ruin his customer’s fun, he always kept a part of the road nice so people could get to Treetop. In fact there
was a nice curvy, well kept path from the corner of Main and Park that ran diagonally through Park Street and right up to the elevator of Treetop Games. He even added some things: A little Koi pond, some benches, with different plants and posted information, like a zoo. No matter what the owner of Treetop did though, he couldn’t hide the creepy, ghost town-like feel of the rest of Park Street. Over the years, the plant life had slowly washed over the abandoned buildings and sprinkled itself in every nook and cranny where the seeds could grab a foothold. The trees reached out over the middle of the street, grabbing as much light as possible, and hanging over the sidewalks as if to snatch unwary pedestrians. The path to Treetop Games was lit and clear, but the rest of Park Street was abandoned and dark. Needless to say it was kind of spooky at night.
Then throw Tony into the picture, a little kid with a giant imagination, high on caffeine and sugar, who had just spent the last three hours killing zombies and being chased by dragons, and who now has to ride his bike through this forgotten stretch of neighborhood in the dark. A kid in that situation hears things: just out of sight behind you, close enough to reach out and grab you, fast enough to keep up with you riding your bike at full speed, things that make your spine tingle and leave your memory in snapshots, things that make everything seem like a movie. It can seem freaky at the time and it sounds silly to think about it now, but was it? How silly was it? How much of a survival mechanism is it? What evolutionary adaptations poured through Tony’s veins those nights, testing his flight or fight instincts? Was his brain teaching him survival skills by suggesting something in the dark was about to grab him, even though it was perfectly safe? It is amazing how a kid’s imagination can propel them to play games and act out crazy situations. In a world without danger, those games can be seen as silly and pointless. Yet in a world rich with danger and death, those silly games become life or death training exercises. All mammals play, in the wild, in cages, in society.
As he grew up, he used every one of his little kid tricks to get his parents to take him to Treetop, and hopefully to buy him a game. Until eventually Tony’s parents heard that games are evil and were going to turn him into a monstrous killing machine. That’s when the fun really started and Tony’s storytelling skills began to develop post-haste. His parents stopped taking Tony to Treetop and he had to figure out how to go by himself. Save an extra quarter from his lunch money all week by skipping the burrito and getting the cheap pizza, and you can go on marathon gaming sessions in the dark corners of Treetop Games on the weekends. Of course, limited quarters means that you had to get better or it wouldn’t last you that long. Getting up in the foggy summer mornings before anyone and riding his bike down there to be the first to play the newest games. New games arrived on Saturday morning, perfect for the young video game enthusiast. He was always there, quarters in pocket.
That’s where Tony met the first real friend he had in Valley Forest. One day, this other kid started showing up before they opened also. “Who is this nerd?” Tony thought. “Who did he think he was? This was my arcade!“ One day, they were both there waiting for Treetop to open, so Tony said “Hi”
Perry replied, ”Hey.”
“Are you the one that broke my Galaga high score?” Tony asked.
“Yep. 198,000… and that’s just the beginning.” Perry said with friendly but competitive smile.
“I am totally gonna destroy that score today!” Tony shot back.
And that was that. Perry and Tony quickly became best friends. Together they were the masters of all high scores in that arcade. Tony always put his high score initials as ASS, Perry always put his initials as BUT. Every game in that arcade was filled with ASS and BUT, their own little joke.
Perry had his favorite games and analyzed them to death. He shared his knowledge, as did Tony. Together, they analyzed and compounded their knowledge and therefore their friendship. Their friendship quickly added home video game consoles as they became more popular. Once Tony’s parents saw them playing Duck Hunt and Super Mario Brothers all their thoughts of gaming being evil were dispelled.
One day, a couple days after they both got their first Nintendos. Tony saw Perry at school, Perry was more excited than Tony had ever seen.
“I found a way to get unlimited lives in Super Mario!!” Perry said.
“What!? How!?” Tony thought he had gone off the deep end.
“You hit the turtle against the wall and you jump on it and it bounces you up and you keep doing it and you keep getting free guys!” Tony barely understood him, so Perry grabbed a piece of paper and drew a diagram. He drew some stairs, and a turtle with an arrow, meaning it was going down the stairs and then he drew a horrible looking Mario sitting on the first stair.
“And when he’s right there you jump! Haha. It’s so awesome, I have to show you!”
Tony knew the spot he was talking about, but couldn’t picture what he was saying. They talked about it all day and Perry kept reassuring Tony is was real. He told everyone, and by the time school was out, any and all gamers at school were going home or to their friend’s house to try, as Perry dubbed it, “The Secret to Life”. He thought since he discovered the secret, he should name it. And that’s the name he wanted, “The Secret to Life”, because you get as many lives as you want. Made sense to him.
After school, at Tony’s house, they popped in Super Mario Brothers. Perry let Tony try it first, coaching him until the precise moment. As the point neared, Tony could see Perry in the corner of his eye, slowly arcing and stretching his body until the exact moment….
His finger shot out at the TV, “JUMP!” while somehow jumping from his seated position.
Tony pressed A, jumped and bounced on the turtle twice, and the turtle bounced against the wall and back at Mario, and the collision knocked him up, this happened over and over as the point bonus kept doubling until it turned into 1UPs and soon Tony was getting extra guys for every bounce. Perry was right, he had the biggest smile, he found the coolest secret to the best game at the time. From then on, finding the best secrets and bugs in games was an art form for them, and one they enjoyed.
Perry was always better at fighting games, while Tony was better at point based games. Perry would win at Karate Champ, Ring King, Street Fighter 2, and the many permutations that followed. Tony always had the higher scores on Robotron, Pac Man, Galaga and anything not combat-related. Together they would eat through any co-op quarter sucker Treetop had, made sure to beat every game and have every high score. They ruled Treetop score-wise, there were always some older kids around who claimed they owned the arcade. There were multiple times Perry had to run for his life after beating the older kids repeatedly on a fighting game and laughing about it. Not to mention the old jackasses, who were willing to take kids money betting on games, but would threaten to “Slap that smile right off your face!” after losing money to two 12-year-olds who just schooled them at Cyberball.
They beat every game available on Nintendo and sent in pictures of themselves next to their high scores to Nintendo Power magazines. This was their lives; every day only dawned so they could get better at another game. Though they weren’t the fat, rich game nerds who got their parents to drive them to Treetop Games and buy every game that they think they want, then go home to their couch with Doritos and presumably fois gras-greased fingers playing them. Tony and Perry rode their bikes to Treetop, over a mile each way, saved every quarter where they could and enjoyed every quarter (almost). And they didn’t confine their interest to electronics. They still played cops & robbers, hide n seek, kick the can, you name it. Not to mention all the games they made up and modified over the years.
Treetop slowly changed over the years, but always kept its heart. You could always buy old games for old systems there and they were always fair with trades. The majority of the place was aisles of console games, with game posters plastering the walls, although most of the outer walls were glass windows looking down on the surrounding city on one side and a light forest on the othe
r. Treetop Games actually had the best view in the city, you could see the whole town. But most customers rarely enjoyed the view, instead fixated on screens. When you ride the elevator up and walk in through the main entrance, retail was to the left, the arcade and food are to the right, slightly elevated. Yep, elevator. Treetop was ten stories tall and there wasn’t a single thing on floors one through nine, like the Space Needle. You could walk up the stairs, but that had to be saved for special occasions like races and dares, not to mention it could be pretty dangerous. Every few years there would be a story of some kid who fell off the stairs. The old, rickety elevator was the best way up. The food was nothing to write home about, but do teenage, game crazed kids care? The microwave cardboard pizza was perfect, anything else would attract a totally different customer. This was for them, exclusively.
The kitchen looked like a 1970s pizza parlor in the 90s. Yellow trim counters, with corners ripped off so you could see the brown fake wood underneath, old gum under all the tables. After so many years, you actually get to know the gum, which is kind of weird. Tony had a piece last for many years. It’s one of those stupid things he never told anyone about (He called thoughts like that Alone Thoughts). He checked for that gum each time he sat there and was sad when one day it was gone. For a minute Tony wondered where it could’ve went, but then the thought slipped and is such a minute memory in an overloaded world that he would never think of it again.
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